CGI wrecking my life!

General Forums Off-topic Chat
#1

I’ve been using blender for roughly 2 years, and its become such a part of my life that everytime I see a movie with CGI I lose track of the story and think about how I could replicate it in blender. :o
Example, last night I went and saw Narnia-very good movie. However the whole time I was thinking;
‘Wow, look at the lighting effects on Aslan’s fur.’

‘How could I get my fluid simulation like the waterfall?’

‘How’d they do such realistic lighting?’

I got so sidetracked, the credits started rolling, everyone was crying and clapping, and I missed all the plot points! :frowning: Similar goes for movies like, King Kong, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings etc.

Am I the only one that suffers this? 8)

#2

I was like that during king kong, but much lesser so. I was 1/2 paying attention to the plot, and 1/2 to the fur/CG :P. I was also trying to figure out wich parts of the movie are green screen (i think about 3/4).

#3

Try being a CG and a Music Freak at the same time.

By the time I get finished listening to all the music, and critiquing style and chord structure as well as watching the pretty explosions and fur animations, well lets just say I’ve missed more than the movie. This is why I always rent movies or watch them on TV- so that eventually I get the plot

#4

i just saw the cro. of narnia. well the CG arent sometimes that bad. the lions fur is quite good, as the beavers. funny is that some CG characters look better than some real actors. anyway the movie was a waste of money in my opinion. german film critics flamed the movie for lame acting dialogs and bad CG while i actualy cannot agree with bad CG.

#5

I get the same feeling when I watch CG-heavy movies, but it usually doesn’t distract me from the plot much, except with Narnia. I thought the CG was abysmal. Aslan was very well done, but the rest sucked imo. The icy water was terrible and even the army didn’t look too great. I was rather disappointed considering even LOTR which is so many years older has better CG. Ah well.

#6

You can get the production diaries to find out. Some of it wasn’t CG but filmed miniatures that were composited via blue/green screen.

This website has some info too:

http://www.kongisking.net/kong2005/proddiary/

I’d say that I do tend to get distracted by the CG in a few movies but it tends to be movies that don’t have much substance. King Kong for example was a great film with great CG so you don’t get distracted from either.

#7

I am still waiting for Peter Jackson to get caught using CG to make him self skinny lol I bet he is still 400 pounds, but with the magic of CG he is 90 pounds…

#8

well narnia is a kid movie, i guess thats also why some of the CG is so bad but from a kids point of view, you will not see that! LOT is for aldults, so where the older star wars movies until JL decided to turn it into a kid movie,
kid never flow ship just has his first battle and kills directly a star ship while all other pro fighters get killed outside. outrageous tallented or better outrageous childish.

quite often i enjoy the CG and often see a movie twice to take a clother look.
war of the worlds hat a hughe impact on me when through the sound. the sound and first blasting scene such sweeped me of my feet.

claas

#9

I’m kinda like that. In fact, one of the main reasons I bought the War of the Worlds DVD was so I could examine the CG elements (and I actually found some pretty nasty compositing errors :o ).

#10

I have seen a recent King Kong special, and I was surprised how slim (relatively) he has become. Took me a second glance to realize it was actually him.

I think this is from the KK video diary, which I own, but I’ll wait until I saw the movie:

http://thelastminute.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/peter_jackson.jpg

#11

I know what you mean, I had no idea it was Peter untill it came up with his name

edit: check out these 2 links, :o


#12

well i am both into CG, and industrial design.

Weta came and gave us lectures on the narnia armour, before anyone else had seen what we were seeing.

my GF is in my class so saw the lectures too.

funny thing is i just enjoyed it as a film, didn’t even notice the armour, (speciffically blocked out all technical things) and she spent the whole movie oggling the little details here and there LOL.

Alltaken

#13

narnia just has a too strong bible message in the movie in my opinion and santa just made me upset about it. i asked myself what i am watching, a phanatsy story or a bible story in form of a phanatsy movie.

LOT has no message and i guess that also made tolkins story that great, next to his more detailed work, but Narnia just shows to much, it puts its story to much into the foreground to a point in which the film itself seems to be only a framework for it.

#14

Well.
I went to shower and started thinking about 3d-stuff… When I came out and was already drying my hair with the towel I realized I hadn’t even used the shampoo and had little if any memory of the actual time in the shower whatsoever… Sometimes when I think about stuff, or pray… I start to think about other stuff, sometimes 3d, or games or something… and I just find myself thinking about things that I wasn’t thinking in the start. Think about it. I’m absent minded.

#15

Sometimes, when something happens or I get antsy, I get up a walk around the house wthout thinking. Beat that!

#16

When I watch a film I alwasys think about the CGI in it the physics behind it all etc.

I some how also think of life as CGI and try to think how I would do it in Blender.

Great way to day dream when in school!

#17

Walking the dog outside for 30 minutes not having any intrest in the animal and think all the time, mmhh what if I do this and that and such, omg then I have an awesome particle effect… darn dog come walk a bit faster… hehe and how do I model that gun… mmhh I need more details on it… hey come on don’t snif there or stop keep walking… hehe hair on my character would make it look even cooler, Laika come on walk … darn animal… Omg what about an rendered that can render from irc commands? ooh awesome and eeasy with python :stuck_out_tongue:

Or under the shower, mmh I need some soap, hehe what about modeling this bathroom :stuck_out_tongue: omg or what about oure car and then make it photorealistic and help my dad selling it for more money then it actually is… hehe maybe a cool My house walktrough animation or something… Nathan Turn off the Shower. O_o?? ooh hehehe I forgot the time. :stuck_out_tongue:

#18

Yeah I’ll agree with the deep CGI pondering in the shower. I’ve thought about doing a realistic render of my bathroom so many times it’s not funny. Or is it? :expressionless:

Or in the city, I think about how cool it would be making a movie with some deaf guy walking towards the camera and the whole city behind him blowing up in a nuclear explosion. Dunno why. Just a random thought thats been floating around in my head for a while. Must make it before I die. Might see it in the Finished Projects some day. :wink:

I suppose CGI thinking aint bad until it starts interferring with important things. Like, ‘don’t wanna go see a movie with friends tonight. Must work on my character.’ How many times I been there… %|

#19

why is that thinking bad at all? when somebody things you are getting goofy, so what? well if you start telling everybody when something falls down you have to do this and press than button in blender to get the same fx it might get a bit annoying for non cg people, but i found myself often amusing people with my mind. you just have to use it in a funny creative way.